i have been called to serve a mission for the church of jesus christ of latter-day saints for eighteen months in the nicaragua managua south mission. my family has agreed to post my weekly emails here, as well as any comments or posts they wish to add.

Monday, October 19, 2015

el 19 de Octubre

this week, i did survive the stress. but let me tell you why it was stressful. because we had three baptisms. repeat, we had three baptisms.

the rain was a little bit of an enemy at night, but thankfully it didn't start to rain until about 8:30, 9pm when we are running from one end of town to the other looking for last minute lessons and everything, but it's soo nice to sleep when it's raining. i've always loved to sleep when it's cold and it doesn't get very cold here. so it's been nice!

let me take you through the week then to show you how many miracles happened. first, the branch had planned an activity for the young men and women to go to Managua and spend the day working on Personal Progress and My Duty to God and getting to know each other.

this is christopher, a less active convert that we were got excited to go to managua for his "mormon adventure". thanks to some faithful leaders, he went and had a great experience. miracle number 1.

tuesday we had a lesson at the church with our district leader and gabriela. she was still a little unsure about her baptism, but thanks to a great district leader and the spirit, we were able to help her recognize her answer that this is where she needs to be. she was interviewed, and we set the ball rolling for a baptism with the other sister missionaries saturday at four pm.

gabriela was the first baptism this area has had in over three months. miracle #2.

miracle numbers 3-infinity happen next. so last sunday, the young women's president and the branch president pulled hilda aside and started talking with her about what she was holding her back from getting baptized. they talked, then we talked, and we sent a plan to have a baptism on the 24th with her little sister claudia. their mom makes our meals, so we were constantly verifying everything, especially their mom's permission. before hand, their mom wanted nothing to do with anything about baptism, but after some discussion on friday with our district and zone leaders, we realized the only thing really holding these sisters back from getting baptized was a signature. the answer that this is the truth, and this is where they need to be was there, so we set fast track plans to get them ready for an interview friday night and a baptism on saturday. at our first meeting on friday afternoon, their mom gave us permission but told us the last word came from daddy, not from mommy. so we came back at eight that night, and after a little bit of discussion, had permission on these two girls. i called my zone leader and simply said "put yourself in a taxi. we have permission." within ten minutes, he was there and within the hour we had two more baptisms ready for saturday night. hilda went with the young men and women to managua, so we had their baptism that night with all them present. another grand miracle happened that their parents and a less active friend came with us. something we never, ever thought would happen.

claudia is the little girl in front, hilda is the one in the middle.

sunday was a fantastic day, one full of joy because we had three confirmations. we also had seven people in church, which was also a great blessing. this is samuel, ruby's little brother. he's a charmer and i just hope that one day his parents will let him get baptized. with time, little one.

(The 2 pictures that should go here didn't load from Janelle's end of things.)

a favorite scripture can be found in alma 31:34-5

::O Lord, wilt thou grant unto us that we may have success in bringing them again unto thee in Christ. Behold, O Lord, their souls are precious, and many of them are our brethren; therefore, give unto us, O Lord, power and wisdom that we may bring these, our brethren, again unto thee.::

alma is praying to help the zoramites come again unto the fold, but it applies to all of the local sheep that have strayed. may we all pray to have opportunities to help bring the lost and fallen sheep back into the Master's fold, so that our joy may be full over one repentant soul (d&c 18)

i love you all, and thank you so much for your support. we have lots of plans to find new investigators so that our month of november can be just as successful as our october turned out to be. thanks for all your prayers, and please continue to pray for our safety, health, and success.